Chinese national convicted of immigrant-smuggling

Patricia Hurtado:

A Chinese national convicted of being part of a ring that smuggled hundreds of Chinese immigrants into the country on fishing trawlers and held them for ransom was deported yesterday to Hong Kong.

Officers from the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's Detention and Removal Operations yesterday escorted Chong Gui Chen to Hong Kong, agency spokesman Marc Raimondi said.

Court records show Chen was arrested in Hong Kong in 1996 and extradited to the United States in 1998 to stand trial in U.S. District Court in Manhattan for his role in the 1993 smuggling case. He pleaded guilty to smuggling charges in 2000 and was sentenced later that year to a term of 121 months in prison.

The smuggling operation came to light after agents from the FBI and the Immigration and Naturalization Service raided houses in Flushing and Maryland, releasing more than 60 illegal immigrants held captive.

Testimony at a 1995 Manhattan federal trial showed about 200 immigrants from China spent 65 days at sea in a fishing vessel. Upon landing in Hampton, Va., in 1993, about 140 immigrants were sent at gunpoint to safe houses in Bridgeport, Conn.

The remaining immigrants were taken to a safe house in Hampton. Some victims later testified they were beaten as gang members forced them to call their families in China and beg them to pay their ransom, at $25,000 to $30,000 each.

Six immigrants whose families could not pay the ransom were transported to a home in Flushing where they were held and beaten until their families could pay the ransom.

A tougher stance on illegal immigration would help to cut down on this sort of criminality.